Autonomous shuttle service Brussels Health Campus

This pilot at the VUB Health Campus in Brussels has 2 phases on 2 different trajectories. The first phase is running from August 2019 to November 2019, and is situated on private terrain. The second phase runs from December 2019 to March 2020, and is situated on public road. In both phases, the service is station-based with a fixed route. The service follows a predefined time schedule. In the first phase the shuttle drives on private terrain with mixed traffic (trajectory A), in the second phase the shuttle will drive on the public road (trajectory B). Trajectory A has 2 stops, whereas trajectory B has 3 stops. The vehicle contains a wheel chair ramp for people with reduced mobility.

The pilot objective is to perform research in a living lab context on autonomous vehicles. The 3 core topics of research are user acceptance, AV technology and spatial planning.

The budget of this project is €450 000 and is funded by Innoviris.

Testing autonomous driving vehicles on public roads is allowed in Belgium under specific conditions. In both phases, a safety operator is present in the vehicle.

The first phase has been concluded at the end of October. No incidents or accidents occurred during this phase. The number passengers transported at the end of the first phase was 594 (average of 16 per day). A total distance of 359 km was driven (average of 10.55 km per day). Overal, the passengers were satisfied with the service in general (average 5.71 on a scale from 1-7). The average operational speed of the vehicle was about 10km/h.